Live hard, Live fast

Ork Rock, Lots of Guns, Lots of Drugs. Run, because there is nothing else.

I KICKED A SEMI OFF A MOUNTAIN

As my feet hit the rooftop I could see the light from the little window in the door to the rooftop access “staircase”, the owners of the Running Wild Gymnastics and Parkour Training Center had the stairs removed. When they told us about it they said it was a security measure, “The only people who should be using that door are beasts and you all know you can make a 40 foot drop, and then get back up, one way or another”. Can’t argue with the truth.

Before I had moved 20 feet I saw a familiar face fill the window of the door. The sudden appearance of bulgin’ red eyes set in a red and orange face adorned with vicious horns would give most people a startle, but I know Edi. Edi is a weird guy, an Oni, he’s the night time bouncer for Running Wild. He’s not just there to intimidate anyone dumb enough to land on our rooftop; he’s there to work as our own personal Ident scanner. Edi never forgets a face, or a voice. Once Edi has seen your face, and been told your allowed in, ID isn’t required any more. All you got to do is know the right word and he lets you in, without sending you into an uncontrolled 40 foot fall. As usual Edi swung the door open to let me in.

“What’s the word”, Edi’s Or’ zet always sounded weird with the Japanese accent.

I replied in Or’zet with the word, and Edi headed back to his position on the couch to the right of the door, that faces the surveillance screens mounted on its left. The door slammed shut as I pulled my back hoof over the threshold.

“Edi.. ya demon… what’s runnin’”.

“Not much… ya depraved hedonist”. The audible clack of horn against horn and the subtle laughter let us know that the burns weren’t nothin to be worried about.

“Can you tell me if Kazaam is still around here, or did he run off to that new age techno joint he’s been goin’ to.” Not stopping to wait for the answer I walked over to the edge of Edi’s, fifth story, indoor, balcony.

.”He’s still here, sayin’ you guys got a new stunt reel you gotta show everyone, been waitin’ for you to get back so he can start it up.”

“I’ll send the link to your com once I get down”, and over the edge I went.

A forty foot drop isn’t that hard to handle it just starts to get boring after the first 20 times you do the same drop. It’s either a wall hug and a roll out at the bottom or you bounce from wall to wall the whole way down. As I made my decent I thought to myself, as I always do, maybe next time I’ll use the climbin’ gear and repel down.

My roll out of the staircase brought me up facing the gym and turned into a walking pace through it. Other beasts were there training. The ones I knew greeted me.

Some said, “How’s it movin’.”

Others came out with, “Whats runnin’.”

However, “You got that stunt vid we’re supposed to be checkin’ out?”, was the question of the evening

I told them all to finish what they were doing and get to the entertainment center to check the vid. As the last few beasts came in Kazaam loaded up the vid link that pretty elf chick gave us and hit play.

The video started off slow gave a title screen, it read “Wrecking EOC”, and played a little fight music. One of the guys said it was from an old video game from around 2000. I didn’t know his name, but I wanna know how this guy knows about video games from 2000. After a few establishing shots, the video started moving.

“So that smoke line movin’ down the side of the highway is me, yeah I’m movin’ fast, and here’s where I jump across the lane of highway.” The video slowed down to show the next bit. I hadn’t even watched yet, but I have to give that elf chick props on her editing this was some high quality video.

“Aaaaaand, this is where I kick a moving semi off a highway!”, and the crowd goes wild.

“Oh but it’s not over yet!”

One of the younger satyrs, a newer recruit that looked about my age, began to say “Is he really going t-?”

“You bet your hooves I’m going to, why not free run on a semi spiraling through the air! Now don’t get distracted get a look at what kazaam is doing over there with that first truck.” At my statement I could see the nods of approval from some of the stronger magicians in the group, and the video started to speed back up again.

“Okay back to me, I’ve made it around the semi once. Am I going to keep following the rotation? or am I going tooooooo?Rrun to the back of the trailer and jump clear over the armored hum vee back to the third truck!” The video began to slow down again at this point, and all I’m thinking is damn this chick is good.

One of the two trolls in the back pipes up, “What’s the point of mounting the third truck?”

“What’s that? Why would I mount a second moving vehicle? Who said anything about mounting the vehicle? I’m takin’ that bitch over better than any hacker can because IIIII’m, going through the bulletproof glass into the drivers chest!” the video speeds back up as I crash through the windshield of the truck and the cameraman launches a grenade at the hum vee I just jumped over.

“Then it’s back the way I came! Springboard off the hum vee! You can quite clearly see the camera man had put there for my benefit.”

As the video shows me reaching the end of the third trailer we hear the com announcement from Jax, “I’m blowing the claymores,” the video shows the audience a nice layout of where the claymores are and where my GPS signal was.

While Jax’s com message is playing on the video I can hear my free running buddy Rico talking slightly to my left, “I’m pretty sure that cameraman was aiming that grenade for that dude in the hum vee’s nads. Wait, what? Did he just say claymores?”, Rico always did love a well placed explosive.

As I turn to look over to Rico I raise my voice, “Oh did I forget to mention the claymores we set up! Well you can plainly see I dodged the claymores, but what’s this? An avalanche I better get out of there!”

Our youngest magician Simon somehow has been one of the loudest people in the room, yes louder than the trolls(don’t ask me how he manages it) excitedly blurts out, “You’re going to run up the avalanche aren’t you?”

“Oh Hell Yes I Am”

“Now that’s my last little contribution to this vid but keep watching I hope the editor put in the shot of how the camera man decided to end this. What am I saying? She’s been amazing thus far. And here are clips of the gun they were setting up to shoot my ass down. And watch the bag.”

As the video shows the bag arcing through the air towards the gun turret everyone gets really quite asking, “What’s in the bag?”

I hold up my hand, “Wait one second.”

Johnny my other free running buddy looks over to Rico, who is smiling as big as a satyr can smile, “Why is he firing a grenade at it?”

And boom “AHHHHHH HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” and the crowd goes wild again. Any one not going crazy loses it when the icing ‘nade our inside man hucked hits. The video ended with one solid shot of the action from beginning to end.

As the replay rolls I can see some of the higher ranked magicians taking a better look at what they can of Kazaam’s work. I lean forward towards them, “Yeah the whole time this was going down you might not have caught it but Kazaam was commanding two elementals to fight the fire elementals you see for a few seconds in the beginning of the action”

“That’s right all that action in about thirty seconds. Three days of planning, Five guns leveled directly at my face, passin’ out three times due to drug and/or alcohol abuse, for thirty seconds of action. Kicking a moving semi off a highway and running along it while it spins made every second worth it”. as the applause fade I decide my job in the entertainment room for tonight was done.

I took my time to scan my eyes across the room enjoying the props everyone was givin’ me and Kazaam for our work. Beasts were Askin’ who the people I was workin’ with were especially who edited the video because we need to get them in for all our stunt tracks. Everyone was laughin’ their asses off and havin’ a good time, askin’ for a replay, getting’ jumpy to go out and try some moves out in the gym, all except for one.

The senior member “on duty” for the night, Elias, the look on his face wouldn’t have been described as amusement. Some might have said the look was of a man that was unamused by what he was watching possibly even displeased by it some may even venture to say that it had angered him. Evan as the video was restarted for a replay I was beginning to think I may have made a rookie mistake – again.

Shades and metal.

I rolled out of bed this morning, and finally started my submersion. That’s been going well, but what the hell. If I wasn’t so overdue to submerge, I probably would have killed for those concert tickets, even if we didn’t have a ‘Run. What the hell though…

So the boys get a call from Smiley, and I figure what the hell. They got another dude who can handle the hackin’ this time. That lame elf, sure, but he knows how to sling code. I can take care of my business for once, since I’m sittin’ on enough cred.

So this Johnson, he tells ‘em to hike out and snatch this band. Basically says just yank ‘em as spectacularly as possible, bonus points if they grab ‘em off the stage, but if they just never make it there, that’s good enough. Then just drive ‘em an hour out and dump ‘em out of the van.

‘Course my crew ain’t idiots. You don’t roll with Black Rock by bein’ stupid. They want to know why. For once, the J answers the damn question. He’s workin’ in the interest of a rival SecuFirm that wants the band’s contract. Figures he makes the current help look like idiots, he’ll be good to roll. And he heard we had some contacts in the Ork Rock scene.

So the boys roll on in, and sure enough, its their old pal, Freddy. ‘Course Fred didn’t know we screwed ‘em last time, but hey… never turn down a free hand. Gets ‘em in easy enough, despite the crazy security.

Meanwhile, the wimpy code slinger has started figurin’ something out. This band’s schedule is just unreal. They play every single day? Seriously? Even on opposite sides of the country? It just ain’t possible- people got to sleep, y’know?

Bit more diggin’ and a blasted Watcher Spirit later, an’ they realize the band sounds identical at every concert. Like not just good close, like note-for-note. Somethin’ funky’s going on with this shit.

I mean what the hell. Fuckin’ posers. I mean I don’t play, and sure I could prob fake it with the right tech, but what the hell? Who the fuck insults Rock that way?

So like my boys dig around, and you know, with some slick searchin’ from the ‘trix, and he manages to find out the rigger they got, he’s like, seriously in to trolls. Seriously, a human all over troll puss? The fuck? Whatever.

So my boys, they grab up some troll er…. “hotties” and they walk up to sec and tell ‘em they got the girls. They roll there eyes an’ let ‘em by, an’ the dude asks ‘em where the rest of the band is! How fuckin’ rediculous! So they grab the rest of the team, an’ get up in there.

And then, the most epic rock concert ever begins, with them wearin’ skillsoft shades, an’ one of them wearin’ a voice synth… and the rigger runnin’ a badass hologram rig over top of ‘em.

Friggin’ crazy.

Shit, I wish all my jobs were so badass. Ah well, at least my bud brought me the voice synth. Ain’t exactly useful, but hell, it’s fun as shit to talk in a death metal growl all the time.